Curious gastronomy – the bizarre viral food cults of social media

The Food Surgeon is the latest YouTuber to be feted for their unusual treatment of edible goods but the trend of doing weird stuff with food is on the rise…

The Food Surgeon Source: YouTube

In the age of Instagram, many of us are well acquainted with the #foodporn hashtag. Usually adopted by those sharing their fine-dining experiences or home cooking achievements, these pictures and videos are most often beautifully photographed, and presented like a DIY version of the pages of a gourmet food mag.

It’s not all about hashtag #noms though - some social media accounts do anything with food but make it appear enticing and delicious. Nonetheless they have gained a huge following.

The latest hero of this growing genre is The Food Surgeon, whose video dissections of food have gained millions of views on Youtube. One in particular, “Reese's Peanut-Butter-Ectomy with Oreo Cream Transplant” has only been online for just over a week but has already had over 1 million views.

The mesmerising footage from a Seattle-based engineer named Jeff has viewers entranced.  Even though he’s so far only uploaded three videos (the other two involve an avocado and a mandarin) he’s fast gaining subscribers.

It also didn’t take long for intrigued viewers to draw comparisons with ASMR, or autonomous sensory meridian response. ASMR is yet another hugely popular online trend for “whisper videos” that are said to give their viewers tingles and make them relax due to the soothing nature of the footage – not unlike The Food Surgeon’s.

The Food Surgeon comments from Youtube Source: YouTube

He’s not the only bizarre food-tuber to gain a legion of online fans. Here are some of the other weird food cults that have taken social media by storm.

Food ASMR

YouTuber SassEsnacks most popular video, with over 1.2 million views, shows her eating Korean black bean noodles. (Source: SassEsnacks via YouTube Source: YouTube

One popular subset within the aforementioned ASMR culture are whisper style videos featuring the sounds of food being eaten. One of the most popular YouTubers within this genre is SassEsnacks, whose videos of her mouth slurping and chewing at a whole array of different dishes have racked up a combined total of over 16 million views.

Muk Bang

The Muk Bang 'Diva' Park Seo-Yeon (Source: TheDiva via Youtube) Source: YouTube

The South Korean trend of eating HUGE amounts of food in front of a camera, known as 'Muk Bang', can net its performers piles of cash for eating particular foods at the request of fans in front of a webcam. The most famous of all is Park Seo-Yeon aka The Diva who is ironically very waif like in spite of being known to polish off over 3kgs of beef in one sitting.

Vintage '70s recipes

From liver sausage pineapple to bananas wrapped with ham, people have become obsessed with celebrating the glorious and somtimes gross recipes of the past. One popular homage to these dishes is the Twitter account 70s Dinner Party. Here are a couple of their prime pickings:

Last meals

What would you eat if you knew it was the last meal you’d ever consume? It’s an idea that intrigued New Zealander and former fashion photographer Henry Hargreaves, who created a fascinating photographic project, titled ‘No Seconds’ whereby he recreated the last meal requests of famous death row inmates.

'No Seconds' by Henry Hargreaves (Photograph: henryhargreaves.com) Source: Henry Hargreaves

It’s not the only unusual food project that Hargreaves has undertaken. He’s also created maps out of food, foods in every colour of the rainbow and treated inanimate objects as food by deep-frying electronics.

Food of the Rainbow by Henry Hargreaves (Photograph: henryhargreaves.com) Source: Henry Hargreaves

Deep Fried Gadgets by Henry Hargreaves (Photograph: henryhargreaves.com) Source: Henry Hargreaves

Hargreaves explains on his epicurean-intrigue on his blog: “I was always fascinated about peoples requests and what they ordered said about their character and personality.”

See more of Hargreaves fascinating food-themed photo projects here.

Breadfacing

(Source @breadfaceblog) Source: Instagram

A 27-year-old Brooklynite of the Instagram account Bread Face Blog has popularised the trend known as breadfacing. A practice as simple as it sounds, it simply involves smushing ones face into pieces of bread.

Food sculptures

Food art by Martin Roller (Photograph: martinroller.com) Source: Martin Roller

Berlin-based artist and photographer Martin Roller takes playing with your food to a whole new level with his highly unique food art series which has gained a cult following in the blogosphere.  Food sculptures are a popular facet of Instagram, but Roller’s are perhaps some of the most unique, including incredibly lifelike sculptures of shoes constructed out of ham and intricicate mazes carved into bread.

Food Gradients

Fans of hyper-organisation will appreciate the work of Brittany Wright of Instagram account @wrightkitchen. The Seattle based photographer has accrued over 139,000 followers for her snaps of foods sorted into patterns and by gradient.

Crochet food hats

Melbourne based Instagrammer Phil Ferguson of @chiliphilly has become famous for his crochet headpieces, with over 139,000 followers tuning in to view his weekly posts of new hats predominantly sculpted in the shapes of food.

The worst food of Instagram

Fed up of pretentious foodporn posts by your amateur-photographer hipster friends? Welcome to @cookingforbae – the anti-foodporn Instagram that collates all the most miserable and nauseating food photos from across the platform into one place. Clearly, they must be doing something right though because they’ve accrued over 146,000 followers in the process!

Spilled food art

Where the rest of us see a mess, artist Giulia Bernardelli of Instagram page @bernulia sees beauty, creating stunning artworks out of food spills. She’s got plenty of fans too, earning thousands of likes for every messy post.

Junkfood inspired makeup

Yes even the ubiquitous online cult of beauty tutorials have delved in the world of food fetishes with Californian freelance make-up artist Tim O, of @skelotim creating looks inspired by junk food. His unique skills have drawn in over 43,000 followers to see what he’ll create next.

Check out the more on strange and interesting food trends here: